Name picked!...

Well I should say that Sue picked the name and I'm not sure if she knew she did. In her comment she mentioned "A Proud Flock", but Sue, I don't know if you offered that up as a name or just a comment. Either way, as soon as I saw it, it worked perfectly. I had kept saying birds of a feather... flock together in my mind...and running over using flock but couldn't get anything from it. I think it describes the way I think about the quilt perfectly..I'm certainly proud of the quilt and my work, and it's a whole flock of birds. SO there you go...

Just so you don't think I've been sitting aimlessly, I got started again on my Christmas Sampler blocks. I just had to get some blocks ready for sewing and I was back in business. Angel girl got done and ready to join the others. I searched Cheri's book to find some substitutions for a few blocks I don't care for and I need to re-size those today and draw up the patterns. I've also been steady hand quilting the Shirley, Goodness and Mercy wall hanging but showing you another row of stitches seems a little anti-climatic, don't ya think?

Well back to the sewing machine!

Many. many thanks...

I must have the weirdest cat alive...I think anyway. He just loves the smell of sweaty feet shoes. Eww! He lays on them every chance he gets.

Wow, I am so overwhelmed! You all saw this quilt come along over the 8 months or so that I made the blocks, and I bet that you thought I'd never finish. Even I thought that once or twice. Thank You, thank you, thank you, for all the lovely comments and praise. I am rather proud of myself for getting this all done. It really was a complete joy to make each and every block. I'm still thinking of a proper name. I really didn't just want to leave the pattern name as it's official name because I want something more personal to me. I like when quilts are named after where you were when you made them, or what was going on in your life...or better yet, what the maker sees when looking at the quilt.

So I stared at it for a while. It wasn't made during any particular time in my life...just sitting on the couch sewing. I do see the birds and colors..but what I see the most when I look at it is that I made it all by HAND. Yes, there are machine pieced blocks, and it's machine quilted. But otherwise every tiny piece was traced, cut, shaped and stitched using nothing but a needle and thread by hand....my hands. No glue or starch or freezer paper...all excellent methods. Just that needle and my fingers guiding every seam under to just the right place, curve, dip or point. I think that's what amazes me the most. *I* did this entire thing by hand. Me. I know I sound like I invented the wheel...far from it. But it's a first for me and I loved every minute of it...still do. SO I think the name will reflect that. Something to do with needle turn and tiny stitches, and the beginning of what is sure to be a life long love affair with this particular art form. I'll let you know when I find the right one.

Now I'm off to make some lunch and try to get some sewing done. I planned to sew this morning but calling in 2 refills (which should have taken 5 minutes) turned into an hour and a half conversation on the phone with the medicine company and a resulting call to the doctors office to replace the script the mail order med place canceled when trying AGAIN to replace my thyroid meds with generics. It's really infuriating how their weasel brains can amass all the ways to try and sneak those cheaper meds in there. Hopefully it's all straight now, but it used up my sewing time

It's finally up and on the wall...

Birds of a Feather*
65 x 78

I will say that I am so glad that it's finally up and done. What started out as a well planned attack went south pretty quick. I didn't explain the procedure to hubby beforehand and he got frustrated not understanding what we were doing. Once we got over the hump of holding this 25 lb.(?) piece of wood over our heads at about 13 ft off the ground on 2 ladders plus the level on top, we drew a line and proceeded to mark the spots for the brackets. Luckily we were able to hit studs on both ends...I did mention this sucker is heavy, right. We got the screws in one brackets and decided to check just to be sure we had the level line perfect. Nope...good thing we checked. Fixed that and put up the second bracket. Now we are in business! Up the ladders we go and I pull my end to the bracket only to hear..."I hope you aren't lined up where you need to be" That is never a good thing to hear. Um, yes dear, where else would I be? Well, then somethings wrong.

The instructions are very clear. Find the center and go 32" left and 32" right...well that means 64 inches apart, right?. Nope. Hubby measures and there's 61 and 3/4 or something like that between the brackets on the hanger. Factory messed up something. Hubby had spent 20 minutes hand turning the last of those screws into the wall studs by sheer force and NOW we have to move them? No way. We took down the holder and moved the bracket on the back of it instead. It was wonderful to have it slip into place.

Okay so Sharon, if you read this please give me any tips for getting a big quilt up on that hanger. Funny but the lady on tv made it look sooo easy. Not so much! We wrestled but up it went, finally with 4 hands and about 8 minutes of fidgeting. Turns out it's not so easy to get a big quilt up on the hanger but with 2 people it can be done...eventually. So it's done and I love it. I know it seems very immodest, but I'm proud of this quilt. This isn't the final picture, but I think it's good enough for today.

On another note, I realized that I have been getting nothing done recently. I started watching a movie yesterday to sew binding by and after 2 hours the movie was over and I never went and got the quilt! I just sat there watching. I think maybe I need to check the thyroid meds. Nothing stays in my brain. I should be getting more blocks done, but the thought fly out as easily as they pop in. SO I apologize for the lack of anything quilty. I am going to devise some sort of system to have things ready to go at all times and try and stay attentive to what I am doing at the present moment. Next up with be to assemble the top for the Tumbler quilt. I have the first two rows on the design wall ready to be cut down and sewn together. You also might notice that I changed a few things on the side bar listing of current projects. The quilt that I was making called Road Less Travelled is on hold for a while. I lost all steam for the blocks and they are so tiny it takes forever to put them together. I decided to focus on the Christmas Sampler and try getting that done before Christmas this year! Plus 2 other homespun quilts I have in the works. I'll keep you updated.

* I need a name for this quilt! That's the hardest part for me..naming quilts. Any suggestions would be welcome, toss them right out. I'll have to look at it a while to see what name it needs. It also isn't that rippled at the bottom. That was the side that was folded the worst and it has to hang out.

Oscar the cat...

Anyone who has cats knows how smart they really are. My sweetie found this article online and shared it with me...I thought it was worth sharing with all of you.

Oscar the Cat

PS: **By the way, subsequent reports have him up to being correct 28 times in a row.

Quickie Post...

At exactly 6:18 last night I put the last quilting stitch in the Birds of a Feather quilt! Insert the hallelujah chorus and "angels singing".... It's done.

The bias strips are cut and waiting for me to sew them together, then I have to unload the big table and trim, sew down the strips and start hand sewing the binding. I couldn't begin to get a real picture of the finished product, so I'll wait until Saturday when it goes ON THE WALL!!! Yes, the quilt rack is finally going up under penalty of serious harm and the quilt goes on the wall.

So many thanks to everyone for understanding how insanely frustrating it is to have to deal with people who don't even realize the impact they can have on someones life. Don't worry about someone having to step in for my mom and champion her cause..we will. But she has a sharper tongue than I do. She's gotten worse...worse? or better? as she got older. I think that's where I get it from and why I've gotten worse more vocal as I've gotten older. She takes nothing off anyone, and when I see her getting silent I know she's getting broken and depressed and giving up...and it takes a load of crap to get her to that point and THAT makes my blood boil.

Now off to sew...Happy Quilting!

Hospital rant...

I have to get this out, so if you don't want to hear me complain feel free to click on by. You will not hurt my feelings.

The one thing I hate worse than anything is incompetence. Peoples incompetence at their jobs and how it effects other people. I think I mentioned that I took Mom to chemo last Friday already, well before she started chemo they gave her the option of putting in a picc port. It's a contraption that is surgically implanted into her left upper arm so that they don't have to find a vein every week and stick her. They use what can only be described as a giant thumb tack to access her vein and get started. Hers has hurt since the day they inserted it. She's had horrible pains down her arm and it's only been used once. Well Friday we went and they couldn't get into the port. She held my hand and squeeze so tight I almost started crying. Second nurse came and again, no luck. It's very hard to feel your mother go through such agony and keep from kicking the nurse right in the face, let me tell you. Finally they determined that the port had flipped over and they were essentially trying to stick the needle into the hard plastic/metal backing...that's why it wouldn't go in. So we made an appointment to go back into the hospital for another procedure to flip it back right side up.

That was yesterday. I couldn't go because the new bed was coming to be installed, so my 2 sister's went. She had to be there at 10am. At 11:20 they take her downstairs where she proceeds to sit for 3 1/2 hours on the gurney waiting. My sister calls about 3:45 to say they called and they are just now taking her back for surgery. Turns out they had emergencies and kept thinking they'd would be ready in 20 mins and wouldn't let the gal bring her back upstairs to wait in her room. Finally she wakes up and they say they did NOTHING! The left arm is twisted multiple times and that's why it hurt so badly. They were going to move it to the right arm and that arm has horrid veins and can't be used. SO the doctor decided that he didn't feel comfortable to do the fix on the left arm since the other guy did it first, so her just closed her up and sent her BACK! to wait for the original doctor when he comes back from vacation. WHY did he even attempt it if he was going to punk out and throw up his hands? Why put her through that? He just didn't feel like doing it. Hope he likes NOT getting paid.

She's so depressed now I think they have finally just about broken her spirit. She went into this very strong and ready to go and time after time, stupid doctors, stupid office workers and stupid mistakes have been made that just keep beating her down. At some point she's going to just give up and once that happens she will be defeated. A positive attitude is very important in this whole fight and little by little they are just beating it out of her. She feels horrid, we tried to explain that they were going slow with the chemo and just because she felt fine the first 2 weeks she wouldn't always feel that great. Now with 3 weeks of poison in her...{lets face it that's what chemo is...poison} she feels sick, tired and can't sleep. I have to beg her to take the nausea pills, she thinks it's better to just tough it out. Her hair is coming out in handfuls and even though she said it wouldn't bother her, it is...as we knew it would.

I am just so mad that one more incompetent jerk had to lay on another layer of pain and frustration. Worst yet I can't do anything about it...but boy would I love to give some people a piece of my mind. But I have her to think about and that's worse. Just makes my blood boil. Thanks for listening if you got this far. I'm going back to try and finish this quilt. Quilting is always a good place to retreat to!

Checking in...

Can't believe that it's been so long since I posted! We've had company from California and I've been out almost every night, then when home I've been on a mission to finish the quilting on my Birds of a Feather quilt. I do have to take breaks as otherwise I'd be severely cripple. But I've also been taking my turns with Mom. We did Chemo Friday and then got lunch and picked up a few things for her and brought them back to the house. Today I had doctors appointments for me and grocery shopping for her and I ran out to get her meds. So my days have been pretty busy. She's doing well, but getting more tired as she goes along and the hair is about to leave for good and she's not taking it as well as she thought she would. But she has a wig already and plenty of cool scarves, so when she's ready I'll bring over the clippers and shave it all off.

One reason I posted was I wanted to show a few posters pictures that I promised I would take. Several people emailed and asked how on earth a big quilt fits on a little domestic machine. Well pretty easily...This pic shows the right side rolled and the block I am beginning to work on is right in the center of the quilt. Notice that I have plenty more room under that arm. I could still get a few more turns of the roll under there.Make sure to get all the quilt pulled up and make a nice puddle on the left side and in the back so that nothing drags against your needle. My hands are ready and once I put the camera down my right hand will go on the side and I will be able to move the quilt right where I need it to go. I do use the gloves with the rubber nubs on the palm to give me some grip.Then the very most important thing to remember is to make a nice puddle of quilt on your lap. If that quilt drags on the table front it will feel like it's glued down! You can see the nice loose puddle I have in my lap!

Lastly, I went to read Sharon's post about her latest projects and saw Clyde's picture and immediately thought of Noodle! He lays like that all the time on the off chance that as you walk by him you will take pity and lean down to scratch his belly. Simpleton has a good idea...it seems to work every time! Who could resist that??

Hopefully tomorrow I'll be sitting and sewing the binding down on the quilt. I only have 3 borders to quilt and it will go very quickly once I get to sew. Our new bed arrives tomorrow!! Yippee! A wonderful Sleep Number bed. I didn't realize how awful our mattress was until I went to Primitives and didn't have back pain for 5 days! Back home....hello pain! New bed should do the trick!